


(It's time to leave this town) it's time to steal away

by bruisingknees



Category: Druck | SKAM (Germany)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Canon Trans Character, Established Relationship, Fluff, M/M, Road Trips
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-12
Updated: 2019-06-12
Packaged: 2020-05-02 05:46:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,302
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19192957
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bruisingknees/pseuds/bruisingknees
Summary: They just get in a car and take off down south to try and chase the nice weather - catch some sun and catch some waves. They're headed down to Portugal, but that’s 2500 kilometers away and a lot can happen in 2500 kilometers.





	(It's time to leave this town) it's time to steal away

**Author's Note:**

> I keep thinking about this road trip they’re going to be going on. Is it just going to be the two of them? Who’s driving? WHOSE CAR ARE THEY TAKING? Many questions! But also: much excitement! So I wrote this* so my feelings and excitement had an outlet. 
> 
> (* This being a more rambly stream of consciousness-esque work. Wouldn't call it full!fic but it's words, and according to my friend Lisa I'm a fan, and it's words of fiction, so it's fanfiction. Please excuse the mistakes and typos!)
> 
> Hope you enjoy! Title from Road Trippin' by The Red Hot Chili Peppers

They just get in a car and take off down south to try and chase the nice weather - catch some sun and catch some waves. They're headed down to Portugal, but that’s 2500 kilometers away and a lot can happen in 2500 kilometers. 

It takes them all day to even get out of Germany. At the end of the day, they find a camping site in Belgium and then get rained on all fucking night. Everything is wet, _everything_. And they’re idiots, cause they could’ve (should’ve) left some things in the car to keep it all dry and safe, but instead they took it in the tent with them and now it’s all damp. 

They’re just happy they managed to put up the tent in the first place, to be honest, cause that was an ordeal. 

Matteo kept saying: “We should’ve gotten the one that just flips open when you throw it in the air,” but them and what money? They were actually able to borrow this tent from Carlos’ aunt’s girlfriend’s dentist or something. It’s this old thing that you have to put all the fucking poles together for yourself and stuff, but once it’s up it’s actually very sturdy and impressive. It’s just the getting it up part. 

Matteo is so done with it ten minutes in, he’s so fucking done. And then David is annoyed cause Matteo left him to do the majority of the work while he went to ‘buy dinner’ in the little store on the campsite, and then took 40 minutes to get back - during which David had set everything up by himself _and_ had worked himself up in a mood. 

But the food helps, and Matteo does grovel a bit, and that helps as well. It’s late by the time they’ve managed to get set up and eat and everything, and then it rains all goddamn night because it’s Belgium. 

When they wake up everything is just slightly damp. Belgium is a total bust and they stay in the tent most of the morning because they don’t want to go out and face the actual rain. So instead they kiss and Matteo keeps saying the rain is actually really romantic and David doesn’t know why he allows himself to get seduced in a damp tent in the Ardennes, but he does and here they are. 

 

They finally get a move on around noon, missing the check out time and having to pay for an extra day. They contemplate staying another day now they’ve already paid for it, but the rain isn’t letting up so they decide to say fuck it and head down to France. The rain doesn’t magically stop once they hit the French border, which makes for a dreary drive that day, but they sing along to the radio, or to one of the playlists David made for the trip, and it's not so bad. 

They stop at a gas station for snacks and drinks, and have a picnic in the car, the rain beating down on the windows. Matteo calls it romantic again, and there’s Cheetos dust all over Matteo’s face and it smells faintly like gasoline from the gas station, and yet David is allowing himself to be seduced again. 

 

They'd made it just past Paris when they decide to grab some beds in a hostel for the night. Trying to communicate with the girl behind the register in English proves to be another Ordeal. It’s kind of a common theme during their trip. David’s English is decent and Matteo can definitely get himself be understood, but trying to talk in a language you don’t fully master with other people who also don’t fully master it can lead to ridiculous situations. 

They end up in a 12-bed dorm, but luckily their beds are next to each other. The room is filled with snoring men, and the next day they both have to agree that they slept better in their sleeping bags in the rain than in the hostel. One point for Belgium. 

They go out, looking for breakfast, and find the biggest, tastiest croissants they’ve ever had. They buy a couple more for the road and get some chocolate éclairs as well. They’re otherworldly amazing. Matteo and David get cream all over their hands from them, and Matteo tries to lick chocolate off David’s face and they end up making out in the back of the car for thirty minutes before they leave. 

At least the rain’s stopped and the sun’s coming through for them by that point, though. They drive with the windows down and the music blasting. Matteo forgets sunscreen and by the end of the day his right arm and collarbone are slightly pink. 

They almost make it to the Spanish border that day and get a spot on another camping site. Matteo helps out with the tent slightly longer this time around, but he still gets bored and annoyed with it before it’s done. He makes sure they have dinner though, and they use their little burner for the first time, to heat up some hotdogs. Matteo doesn’t know if they’re just really great hotdogs, or if they just taste better because they’ve put so much effort into this and they’re out in the beautiful sunset. They stay out until the stars come out, but by then the mosquitos are making their presence known as well. 

David lathers bug and mosquito repellent all over himself and it fucking stinks. When Matteo tries to kiss his neck it tastes horrendous and he just can’t get the taste from his tongue. He kisses David as payback, pushing the bitter, gross flavor into his mouth and before long they’re scuffling on their sleeping bags.

Scuffling turns back into kissing though, for some strange reason, and either the gross taste is just disappearing or they don’t fucking care anymore. 

“I wish we could have sex like out in the open,” Matteo pants. 

David bursts out laughing. “Okay, kinky.”

Matteo blushes and scowls. “No, like under the stars, it’d be romantic.” 

“Oh, exhibitionism is romantic now,” David nods. 

Matteo shuts him up with another kiss. 

 

Bordeaux is beautiful and they spend the following day exploring the city. They eat more croissants, and Matteo declares it’s his new favorite food. They have ice cream for lunch and walk all over town until their feet hurt. David keeps hunting for the perfect souvenir, but he hasn’t found it yet. He tells Matteo he knows what it'll be when he sees it.

He does send Laura a postcard and asks Matteo if he wants to send his mom one. When Matteo isn’t sure, and doesn’t really want to talk about it, David doesn’t push but instead kisses Matteo's shoulder before going on with picking out a card for Laura. (Matteo ends up picking out a card for his mom, and David keeps them safe in his sketchbook so they don’t get damaged in their bags.) 

They make hot dogs for dinner again, but this time around they’re a bit burned and the buns aren’t as good as they were the night before, but it’s still inexplicably tasty.

 

They pack up the next day and make it down to Léon in Spain. The Cathedral is phenomenal and they have beers and tapas on the square, looking out onto it. They grab another room in a hostel and it must be their lucky day cause not only did they have the most lovely first day in Spain, but their beds are the only two that are rented out in the four-bed dorm room. They shove the beds together, and it’s uncomfortable cause Matteo keeps falling in the crack, but he refuses to admit defeat. They end up mostly sleeping on David’s narrow bed one-person bed, but they make it work and it’s the best sleep they’ve had the whole trip so far. 

 

They make it to Portugal the next day, and it’s scorchingly hot. It takes them twice as long to set up the tent because David refuses to do it by himself this time, and keeps taking breaks to lie in the shade and huff and puff. Matteo brings him cold water from a little shop nearby and uses his ice-cold-water-bottle-cooled-hands to rub comfortingly over David’s neck. 

They seem to have set up camp on mosquito-rich land though, or bug-rich land in general, and David is back to tasting like mosquito repellant. 

“I hate this,” Matteo whines, “I can’t even kiss the small of your back, you’ve been so thorough.”

“You should take a page out of my book,” David warns him. 

“And taste like the inside of a pharmacy?”

 

The next day Matteo wakes up covered in mosquito bites. 

 

They itch and he has some sort of allergic reaction to one on his upper arm and they even have to go to the pharmacy. 

It’s almost impossible to communicate with the Portuguese pharmacist so Matteo just ends up showing her. She winces when she sees the bite with the allergic reaction and that’s never a good sign. She gives them an ointment though and some sunscreen, which Matteo takes to mean: lather up. 

They go swimming a lot that day, and David is always on him with the ointments and the sunscreen every time they get out of the water. If Matteo even so much as thinks about scratching, David is there to slap his hands away. (But in David's defense, he also puts ice cold bottles of water against the bites and kisses Matteo until he feels better.) 

They doze in the sun and have cheap, weak cocktails on the beach and it’s great. 

 

They run out of condoms two days later. They last 16 hours before they go looking for more. They can’t seem to find any in the little grocery stores around. 

“What kind of no-sex country is this?” David mutters. 

“We should’ve brought more from home,” Matteo laments. 

Matteo didn’t figure they'd be running out that quickly, but here they are. David is sticky and sweaty from the hot Portuguese sun and he’s wearing a truly ugly hat and some Hawaiian style shirt and Matteo still really, really wants to have sex with him right now. 

They try their luck in another pharmacy and Matteo thinks: surely it can’t be as bad as last time. But it is. It is. 

This pharmacist doesn’t understand them at all either and all Matteo can think is: I can’t pull my dick out, like I got that mosquito bite out, to show her. 

Right before he’s about to resort to a very crude hand gesture, David gets out his phone and translates condom to Portuguese on google. The woman goes: “Aaah,” and her eyes go back and forth between them for a second before giving them a box of condoms. 

Dreading the thought of having to do this again, Matteo asks her: “Dois?” and holds out his fingers to indicate two in case he butchered that with his accent. 

David mutters “oh my god,” at him, but doesn’t try and stop her as she puts another box of condoms on the counter. 

“Did you want to have to return and do this again?” Matteo asks him when they leave the store. “There’s nothing to be embarrassed about.” 

“You can’t even buy condoms back home cause you get all shifty,” David accuses. “Don’t talk to me about there’s nothing to be embarrassed about.”

“What are you talking about?” Matteo asks. 

“You’ve bought us condoms exactly once, and you came home with like 15 other things as well.”

“I couldn’t just buy the condoms!” Matteo says. “That would’ve made me look like I was ready to go – like I was just gonna go home and have sex.”

“You were supposed to come home and have sex! But instead you made me wait forever cause you bought fifteen things you didn’t even need. You bought an umbrella.” 

“Whatever!” Matteo says. “We’re all stocked up now so like.” And he wants to ask: do you want to go back to the tent? But it’s only 2 in the afternoon and he also doesn’t want to presume or whatever. But before he can say anything else David asks him: “So should we go back to the camping site or?” 

 

David’s turned all golden from the sun and he looks so good, sweaty stickiness and all. Matteo, in turn, has turned all red and is covered in mosquito bites. The skin of his nose has started peeling, and now he’s the one who constantly smells like ointment. 

Matteo is convinced the waitress at the bar they’re having a beer at is flirting with David and it’s putting him in a bad mood. She calls his accent adorable and David has the nerve to flush at the compliment. 

Matteo grabs his phone to google _he’s my boyfriend_ in Portuguese, but in the end he just ends up playing some dumb phone game. 

David plucks the phone out of his hands and puts it in his own pocket. “Pay attention to me,” he demands. 

“Oh, I thought you were getting enough attention already,” Matteo shrugs. 

David rolls his eyes and says: “I just got directions for a place we can go surfing tomorrow, and if we mention the waitress’ name we’ll get a discount. She knows the people who run it.” 

“Popular girl,” Matteo says. 

David kisses him in front of the waitress, so he’s willing to forget about the flirting. 

 

David ends up being great at surfing. Matteo ends up being less than adequate. He ends up spending most of the day sitting on the beach, watching David instead. It’s still pretty fun. He sticks to the shade and takes about a billion pictures and videos of David on the board. He sends some to Jonas, who replies with a sad smiley face and the heartbroken smiley. After, he sends Matteo pictures of his own vacation with his family though, and he looks like he’s having a great time. 

They facetime Laura that evening, and after that they facetime Hans. Hans is so excited to see them and asks them a million questions. He takes them around the flat and shows them things like they’ve been gone much longer than a week. 

“He misses you,” David says when they’ve hung up. “It’s sweet.” 

“Yeah, yeah,” Matteo shrugs, secretly pleased. 

 

The plan is to drive down the coastline to Lisbon, but they end up spending the night in Caldas da Rainha and liking it so much they stay there for the next two nights as well. There are all these things going on in the town, there are markets and fairs, and the people are so welcoming and the food is amazing. They get drunk on wine and have to shush each other when the stumble home to their tent at night. Almost nobody speaks any English so they end up pointing at things on the menu and getting something else than they were expecting more than half the time. 

Matteo falls in love with francesinhas and orders only them from the moment he has his first one. Every restaurant makes them differently, and they’re the most ridiculous sandwiches either of them have ever seen. Matteo absolutely loves them and takes a picture of every single one. He vows to start making them at home as well. 

"I'm bringing the francesinha to the German people," he says. 

“There are more pictures of these sandwiches on your phone,” David says, “than of anything else. Than of me.”

“I have plenty of pictures of you,” Matteo says. “Besides, I can always look at you. Once I eat this sandwich it’s gone and I have to wait until our next meal to see one again.”

“You’re obsessed.”

 

That night, back in the tent, Matteo takes out his phone and shows David all the pictures he has of him on his phone. 

“You made a folder?” David asks. 

“Don’t get excited,” Matteo mumbles, “I made the francesinha a folder too.”

“Of course you did.”

“There’s more pictures in your folder though.”

“There better be.” 

 

They spend the whole next day starting their slow way back North, back home, driving to Bilbao. It’s an exhausting day and they’re sweaty and grumpy by the time they make it to a camping site. The first one they try is fully booked, and it takes them a while to get to the next one. They’re getting grumpier and more tired with every passing minute, and putting up the tent is such a frustrating task that they aren’t speaking to each other by the end of it. Matteo’s gotten bitten by three more mosquitos, and one bite on his leg is looking alarmingly like it wasn’t a mosquito but something else. 

He wants to ask David if he thinks a spider laid her eggs in his thigh, but he thinks David is genuinely angry with him, and the thought makes his stomach turn. 

It feels like there was less room between them when they slept in that 12 person dorm room. Matteo also slept better there, surrounded by the loud, snoring backpackers, than he does in the quiet tent with just David. 

When Matteo wakes up the next morning he’s alone in the tent and for the tiniest, most heartbreaking moment he thinks David left. But then he can hear things outside, pots clanging and water pouring, so he gets outside in just his underwear to find David making them breakfast. 

“Are you charging for the show?” David asks, looking around to check if any of the other people in the tents have woken up and/or looking at a more than half naked Matteo. 

David is smiling though, squinting through the morning sun hitting his face, and Matteo doesn’t care – he could be naked in front of the whole of Spain for all he cares. Something must show on his face, cause David comes and gives him a hug and kisses his neck softly. “Sorry I was grumpy,” he apologizes. 

“Sorry I’m shit at helping to put up the tent,” Matteo offers. 

“You really are,” David nods, “But I shouldn’t have gotten so frustrated. Sorry.”

“It’s okay,” Matteo says honestly, holding on to David’s shirt. 

They eat the breakfast David put together for them and go out to explore the Bilbao after. The city is truly beautiful and David finally finds his souvenir: a snow globe with Puppy, the flower dog in it. They drink Sangria and eat tapas and that night is a much, much happier night in the tent. 

 

The next day they drive about 600 kilometers up North to Poitiers, in France. 

They desperately need to do laundry, so they find a laundromat near the hostel they’re staying in that night. They’re rooming in a 6-bed room, and all other beds are occupied. They aren’t sleeping next to each other either, which is a bummer but the thought of sleeping in an actual bed does lift their spirits. 

The French laundromat looks like it’s glory days are long gone, and so does the old lady who’s reading a paper in a corner, keeping an eye on things. They’ve just started the machine when Matteo spots the biggest cockroach he’s ever seen. He jumps about half a meter in the air, startling David in the process. The lady starts yelling at him in French. He’s pretty sure she’s telling him to stop making a scene but excuse the fuck out of Matteo for startling at a Godzilla sized cockroach. 

Matteo sits on one of the tables people use for folding their laundry the whole time they’re waiting for their laundry to finish. He keeps throwing furtive glances around to see if they’re not about to be attacked by more insects. David laughs at him and keeps reminding him about the old lady yelling at him for being afraid of a bug. Matteo just keeps rolling his eyes in response. 

The night in the hostel isn’t much better than the laundromat experience, and Matteo isn’t unhappy to leave the town the next day. They grab some croissants for breakfast though, and while the francesinha has his heart now, the croissant still holds a solid second place. 

They leave Poitiers and drive up to Reims. They could’ve driven a little further that day, but they’re in no hurry to get back to Germany so they make another stop in France and set up camp. They roast marshmallows over a fire but they keep burning them. Matteo tries to remove the blackened outside but ends up somewhat burning his fingers in the process. David kisses his fingertips better and when he finally kisses Matteo's lips, they taste burned. 

 

Reims is another one of those beautiful French cities with a huge, beautiful cathedral. They stroll around it a couple of times, walking through the historic city center and taking selfies in front of everything. Because they did laundry, David is wearing his Hawaiian shirt again. His skin’s even darker now because of the sun and he looks so goddamn handsome. (Matteo, on the other hand, is still all pink and burned. He swears it’s his German side fighting with his Italian side and fucking winning.)

They get a bit drunk on cheap cocktails and even cheaper beer, and they sleep in the next day. Luckily the camping site doesn’t make them pay another day so they pack up and make the short trip to Maastricht in The Netherlands. 

 

The camping site there isn’t as busy as some of the others they've been to, and they pick out a lot by the lake, under a tree. Matteo is super proud of how good he’s gotten at helping David set up the tent. They’re like a well-oiled machine by now, and he even thinks he’ll be a bit sad giving the tent back to Carlos’ aunt’s girlfriend’s dentist or whoever. 

They have a look around Maastricht and David falls in love with all the Dutch architecture. He spends half the afternoon sketching on a bench, and Matteo wanders off to buy them ice cream at some point, but mostly he just watches David draw. In the evening Matteo drags David into a coffeeshop and they snicker at some of the names of the different types of weed, and end up buy something that sounds funny. 

When it starts getting dark they go sit by the shore of the lake outside their tent and light up. David’s lying on his back, Matteo’s lying between his legs, head pillowed on David’s stomach as they look up at the sky. Matteo tries to point out some made up constellations and it’s probably the weed, because Matteo isn’t that funny, but David seems to be laughing along to everything he says. 

They start making out at some point - Matteo turned around and elbowed David in the thigh kind of painfully, but they recovered quickly.

“You wanna revisit that kink of yours?” David asks him and Matteo’s been so immersed in the kissing he has no idea what he’s talking about until David says: “The having sex in the open air thing,”

“Oh, screw you,” Matteo says, “Is this what I get for trying to be romantic? Constant mockery?”

"You're so romantic, baby," David mumbles into his mouth, "So romantic." 

 

The next day they’re not quite ready to go home, so they decide to stay just one more day. They walk around the city square and when it starts raining they duck into one of the shopping centers and hang around there for a couple of hours. David sits and draws Matteo, and Matteo texts the guys in the ok.cool. group. Luckily it lets up after a while and they don’t have to have another damp night in the tent. 

 

The next morning they have breakfast outside, and pack up the tent in silence before loading up the car again. 

 

They’re about 30 km outside of Berlin when David asks him: “What are you _not_ going to miss about our vacation?”

“I’m not gonna miss that sardine thing we had in Portugal,” Matteo says. “And I’m not gonna miss the mosquitos and I’m not gonna miss the snoring Russians.”

“How do you know it was the Russians who were snoring?” David asks. 

“Oh, I fucking know,” Matteo says. 

“And what did you miss from home?” David asks. 

“Video games,” Matteo says. “Our friends. Our beds.”

“You missed _my_ bed?” David laughs. 

“I love your bed,” Matteo answers. “We made a lot of good memories in that bed.”

David smirks at that, “Yeah.”

“What are you going to miss about our vacation?” Matteo asks David. 

“I was trying to cheer us up by talking about the bad things there and the good things at home.”

“Well, tough, I want to know.”

“I’m going to miss the beach,” David says, “And the sun. I’m going to miss hotdogs on the camp burner and I’m even going to miss that stupid tent.”

“I’m going to miss the tent too,” Matteo admits. “But next year we’re buying one of those you throw in the air and it just unfolds.”

“We definitely are,” David agrees. 

They drive in silence for a bit until David says: "I'm going to miss waking up next to you every morning." 

"Well, we don't have to stop doing that," Matteo replies, smiling. 

"No?" 

"No," Matteo agrees. 

"Well, good." David laughs. 

 

By the time they get back they’re completely exhausted. David drives them back to his place and after exchanging hugs with Laura they all but flee to his room to fall into the bed. 

“Good first vacation together?” Matteo asks, eyes already drooping shut even though he still has his shoes on. 

“Amazing first vacation together,” David agrees.

**Author's Note:**

> hello, I'm also on [tumblr](https://bruisingknees.tumblr.com/)


End file.
